How to set attributes for stdClass object at the time object creation

Question

I want to set attribute for a stdClass object in a single statement. I don't have any idea about it. I know the following things

$obj = new stdClass; $obj->attr = 'loremipsum'; 

It takes two statements.

$obj = (object) array('attr'=>'loremipsum'); 

It takes single statement but it is not direct method.

$obj = new stdClass(array('attr'=>'loremipsum')); 

It is not working.

Answer 1

$obj = (object) array(     'attr'=>'loremipsum' ); 

Actually, that's as direct as it's going to get. Even a custom constructor won't be able to do this in a single expression.

The (object) cast might actually be a simple translation from an array, because internally the properties are stored in a hash as well.

You could create a base class like this:

abstract class MyObject {     public function __construct(array $attributes = array())     {         foreach ($attributes as $name => $value) {             $this->{$name} = $value;         }     } }  class MyWhatever extends MyObject { }  $x = new MyWhatever(array(     'attr' => 'loremipsum', )); 

Doing so will lock up your constructor though, requiring each class to call its parent constructor when overridden.

Answer 2

Though Ja͢ck gives a good answer, it is important to stress that the PHP interpreter itself has a method for describing how to properly represent an object or variable:

php > $someObject = new stdClass(); php > $someObject->name = 'Ethan'; php > var_export($someObject); stdClass::__set_state(array(    'name' => 'Ethan', )) 

Interestingly, using stdClass::__set_state fails to create a stdClass object, thus displaying it as such is likely a bug in var_export(). However, it does illustrate that there is no straightforward method to create the stdClass object with attributes set at the time of object creation.